Soldato
- Joined
- 20 Jun 2005
- Posts
- 2,724
- Location
- Derby
Was it, Sounding Sweet who recorded your car?One year anniversary!
It has been a relatively quiet winter hence the massive lack of posting. Not much to report since October really. The car was serviced at the end of October at a cost of £1394. This is the "tock" service of the tick/tock rhythm, with the more minor service coming in at about half the cost. There's nothing particularly standing out to me as especially expensive from the itemised invoice given this is a main dealer service, more than 50% of the cost is labour. I did raise an eyebrow at the air filters costing significantly more than the engine oil but it is what it is I guess. They do give you a nice box of chocolates to soften the blow though
Took it down to the Collecting Cars Donington meet in November and that pretty much wrapped up 2022 for me
I've hardly used it since then in all honesty. It remained tucked away in the garage through to early Feb just waiting for the weather to clear up a bit and for the excuses to use it to come up again. The first run of the year was a run down to Millbrook where my car was used to sample audio for an upcoming video game, which was very interesting. I also took a day out from the madness to head to Caffeine and Machine.
They were very careful plus I have full-car PPF so I wasn't worried about any damage!
Year One Review
I've posted honestly throughout the thread and hope to always present a balanced and unbiased view of the good and bad of ownership, so there shouldn't be anything new here. Looking back through the thread and thinking back through the year, there have been some really good bits and some bad bits. Overall, knowing what I know now, would I buy this exact car again? Absolutely I would, although I would probably not go about it in the exact same way. The start was bumpy and there have been little bits here and there but all is forgiven when put in context of how much I enjoy ownership. In a world of Instagram where the perception is that everyone earns more than you, has huge car collections and the free time to use them all it is really easy to forget just how special it feels to own even just one car like this in a lifetime, especially in my mid 30s where I have the health and opportunities to enjoy it to the fullest. I smile to myself every time I see it, even if I'm just popping into the garage to grab something or walking back to it at a petrol station.
I've covered well in excess of 10,000 miles since picking it up - I've driven it to France and back from Switzerland, toured around Ireland, taken it up to 200mph, been to events, car shows etc around the country and thoroughly enjoyed it all.
What has that cost? Aside from the servicing I mentioned above, I've replaced the rear tyres twice and the fronts once. The first set of rears met their end after a DriveLimits day on ~5k miles, the second set surprised me as they "only" lasted 8k miles and I don't think I've really abused them other than enjoying some spirited driving. In any case, I was looking for an excuse to ditch the MC-rated Pirelli P Zeros in favour of a tyre that works better more of the time in the UK climate. As an aside, I chose Continental SportContact 7 over Michelin Pilot Sport 4S as from the reviews they seem to be the superior tyre. I was very impressed with Continental SportContact 5s in the past in every department except insane wear rate, so if the 7 is improved in this regard as the reviewers claim then I expect to be seriously impressed. My initial feedback given the cold winter conditions is that they are immediately more grippy at every temperature I've seen yet. They are also quieter, or at least make a different noise which I perceive to be quieter. Given the Pirelli tyre has huge foam blocks glued inside, this was a real surprise to me and was noticeable within 100 yards of the tyre fitter. I'll feed back on how they are as time goes on and I have more data. The fitted cost for the set of 4 Contis was £1006. The pair of MC-rated Pirelli rears was around £650 which is very slightly more expensive than the Continentals.
Fuel... I've not tracked this precisely as, frankly, I don't really want to know! I can easily hit 35mpg on a long run, 37-38mpg if I stick the cruise on at 70mph indicated and there's no traffic. Nobody buys a McLaren for fuel economy reasons but it really matters quite a lot when you want to travel long distances in one go. For perspective, the difference between 27 and 37 mpg is about 100 miles extra between fuel stops, which is often the difference between stopping or not stopping at all! On the flip side, it can also hit less than 10mpg no problem when pressing on. This variability is actually somewhat annoying because it means as soon as you peel off the beaten track onto more interesting roads the range you thought you had just evaporates and a search for a petrol station often results. I think a reasoned estimate of my fuel spend would be in the ballpark of £5000. I've also topped up the oil, a little over a litre total which probably comes to about £40. Other than that and screenwash my personal bills have been zero.
Insurance is one of the great mysteries of life and varies hugely from person to person and from car to car. This year, my renewal is £830.
I had the whole car PPFd which has definitely proven to be worth the money as it has some pock marks here and there which would probably have been colossal stone chips. The cost of that was about £2.5k which I think will pay for itself given my usage of the car!
Warranty claims? Yep. Three replacement panels, a fairly significant coolant leak, a drivers door strut, the front suspension "failed" according to the computer which was just a software update to fix, the front boot latch needed some adjustment so I could close it properly and it has an intermittent rattle from the rear which as I type this it is in McLaren for the 3rd (and hopefully last) time to be rectified.
Y1 total, circa £10k spent all-in excluding depreciation, or £1/mile. [NB: Depreciation is hard to judge and a guess at best - one for the end of the road when I look back and calculate TCO.] Honestly, I don't think I can put a value on how much I enjoy it so I don't feel like that is a particularly relevant number for me, just providing numbers for interested readers
Boring reality stuff out the way, what's it really like? Does it meet the requirements I set out to fulfil at the start?
Overall I think it is absolutely superb.
Speaking openly, it is probably better than I thought it would be in some ways and not quite as good in others. When I set out to buy a car, I wanted something that could cope with ~2 weeks of luggage for two, get me across continents comfortably and yet still be amazing fun when out for a drive in Wales or the Alps or wherever the road takes me. The 2 week luggage thing is the Achilles heel of most supercars, or at least it is when one of the two people wants to take a hairdryer, straighteners and who knows what else. The GT has a lot of luggage room - more than enough for a pair of cabin sized bags at the front and then even more storage at the rear. The rear space is a weird shape but also bigger than it looks, which means you can put way more back there than you think... However, it is mostly open to the cabin aside from a section right at the very back which is big enough to take one large or two smaller backpacks - so without adequate strapping it is probably going to hurt if you have to stop in a hurry. The practical reality is that a one week trip is totally fine (and would have been totally fine in a 720S...) but 2 weeks takes some planning and is maybe slightly more compromised than ideal but a compromise I am happy with. Certainly weighted against the alternative in something like a DB11, this is still the right call for my personal blend of wants but it isn't quite as good at accommodating luggage in the real world as I thought it would be.
From a performance perspective it remains about where I thought it would be - more than fast enough, excellent chassis, steering is telepathic and the feedback is really great. I think it fair to say that when at the upper reaches of the performance envelope you can start to feel the GT-ness of the setup vs 720S. Not a criticism, not a bad thing but it isn't quite as on its toes as the "sportier" cars feel when really "on it". All relative of course, you couldn't make a Bentley do the things that this car does in sportiness terms and nor do I think the 720S would be quite as good as the GT long distance. That's about what I thought it was after my first ever drive and I still hold that view today with a lot more experience behind the wheel.
When I first got mine, I'd almost never see another one anywhere. At most big meets I would be the only GT there and there are hardly any owners on the owners club groups etc. That's starting to change a little bit as the market starts to understand the GT a bit more. I've noticed a couple out and about and started to even see others at shows and things. I was in NYC last week and one with an identical spec to mine drove past which is something I never thought I would see.
I'm looking forward to 2023 with the GT - plans include attending an F1 race in Europe, another European long drive adventure, a few UK-based road trips and more besides!
) is definitely a bonus, most people expect older blokes to be driving these "mid life crisis-mobiles".
